


Cubicles

by Loran_Arameri



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Comics), Marvel 616
Genre: Angst, Hurt, M/M, Not A Fix-It, Old Man Steve Rogers, Superior Iron Man, Time Runs Out (Marvel), additional warnings in end notes, hickmanvengers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-23
Updated: 2018-07-23
Packaged: 2019-06-15 03:06:53
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15403584
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Loran_Arameri/pseuds/Loran_Arameri
Summary: After the Illumnati and Sue Storm have captured Steve, they put him in the glass cube next to Tony, instead of trying to work with him.





	Cubicles

**Author's Note:**

> "Join book-club," they said. "It will be fun," they said.  
> The idea for this came from kittkat in the 616 Stony book-club.
> 
> So many thanks to enkiduu for beta.
> 
> There are addtional warnings at the end to avoid spoilers. This is the first fic I ever finished.

When Steve comes to again, he is still in a cube. But not the one Sue Storm had cast, when she inevitably betrayed him. (Maybe it just was her turn.)

This cube is bigger and in a decidedly darker place.

“Rise and shine.”

That fucking voice.

He turns around.

“Welcome, Steve. You are lucky enough to have a front row seat to the Apocalypse.” Tony plays hesitant for a moment. “Well, not the actual Apocalypse, but all the people bringing it about tend to turn up here sooner or later.”

“Like you?” Steve asks. He needs a moment to orientate, figure this out.

“Aw, Steve. You still don't get it. I was the medicine not the disease.” Tony is giving him an all toothed grin. Steve wants to shove it down his throat.

Just keep him talking for a moment. That shouldn't be difficult. He gets up and closes the distance to the glass wall. “And what was I?”

“Mostly? In the way.” Tony huffs. “And about as original as a motivational poster: 'We will figure out a way to win. Because it is what we do.' You had eight months—did you figure out a way?”

Steve is checking the wall, to see if there is anything useful there but it’s smooth, seamless. If it is the same as Tony's, he will not be able to break it, or the other would already have done so.

“I thought we were supposed to leave that to you geniuses.” Wasn't that why they got rid of him, because he was too stupid to see what they were seeing? So they could get on with their machines and their science, without petty things like ethics or Steve getting in the way?

An acrid laugh from Tony. “Now you’re getting it? I mean better late than never, but your timing is shit.” Then he cocks his head slightly. “And 5 minutes of stalling and you still haven’t found a way out of that thing to come over and beat the shit out of me? You really have gotten old.”

For the first time Steve's eyes meet Tony's. “I am not the only one who has changed.” Tony is wearing this new armor again, shining and mirrored where it is not broken. But Steve knows the change of armor is only a symptom.  
“Is that again about me ordering French toast at lunch. Steve, your food sensibilities are getting out of hand.” Tony is talking with his hands. He has always done that, but this is different. Everything is a flourish, only for show.

“And Tamara's daughter? Was that the old you or the new one?” He does not expect an answer. At least not a straight one.

“You mean if I did it just out of the goodness of my heart or for some ulterior motive?” Tony looks at him, bemused. “What's the difference? They are back together. Happily ever after. Which is probably tomorrow. But still. Why does it matter, who did it and for what?  
But to tell you, I did it. Because I could. Tony from eight months ago could not have done it. He tried, but he couldn't. That's why you should be happy you ended up with me here. If there is still somebody who can do something about the mess, it's me.”

Steve feels as if something has been reignited within him. “Don't lie!” Not again, not with words as in the diner and not with touches and smiles as before. Before when he still thought there might be something more between them.

“Why the fuck not? Do you really want to hear that we are going to die, and the planet and most likely our entire universe with it? Do you think that is going to help either of us? I can make a difference and you people better start realizing it.”

There it is again, the egotism that makes Tony leave everyone behind if they are not fast enough to follow his thought process. Or not willing to. Rage is bubbling up behind Steve's sternum.

“Is that what you did out there in California? Making a difference? Pepper told me what you did.”

Tony's grin just dims for the fraction of a second before it slips back on, like a mask. “You guys bonded over trying to kill me. How nice. That's me, bringing people together.”

“You infected a whole city with a virus. For profit. And then used people as human shields.” That still surprised Steve. Even after all that Tony had done, he still managed to do something even more hideous.

“So, you’re angry because I gave people what you already had. The perfect body overnight? I didn't know your hypocrisy ran that deep.”

“Hypocrisy?” Steve notices distantly that he is almost yelling.

“Yes, I knew that nobody but you was allowed to make decisions over other people's lives and the world in general, but -”

Steve cuts in, “I did not make decisions for other people.”

“You decided what all life in the universe was worth and it was not enough to make you yield one bit. What do you call that?” Tony’s eyes glimmer with challenge, eerily familiar on a man he doesn't know anymore.

“Having a backbone and standing up for what's right,” Steve says, loud enough to hear himself over the rush of blood in his ears.

“For what you think is right. And everybody has to fall in line or the discussion is over.” Tony looks surprised when Steve's fist hits the glass and makes it crunch a little.

“You erased my memory.”

“Yeah, we’ve been over that bit. You have it back now. Do you really like it? Because I have a feeling that you’ve been having a really bad time since you got it back.”

Suddenly all the heat leaves Steve. He can feel his mind settling back into the cool, balanced place he knows from battles. Well, except battles with Tony, where everything is always chaotic, and he feels as if his guts are on fire. But this is not Tony anymore. Not the one he knew. Thought he knew.

The stranger in the other cube keeps on talking.

“I didn’t want us to end up on different sides again. Can't you see that?”

The argument is pointless now, maybe always has been. But what else is left?

“You changed my memory, lied to me and used me to get rid of disturbances while you planned how to best kill whole planets. How could we ever end up anywhere but here?”

The man on the other side seems out of words for a moment. But only a moment. “And do you like where we are?”

Does Steve like it? He hates it. This is not as it had been before when he went head to head with Tony. He had been disappointed, angry and disgusted, the inversion of the respect, belonging and tenderness he had felt before. But the cold hatred that has settled in his heart that night and never truly leaves him anymore? That is new. And he doesn’t want it. It’s justified. He knows that much. He doesn’t want to be this cynical old man, but Tony has taken everything else from him.

Apparently, Steve is taking too long to think about this, as Tony rambles on.

“I had one chance at saving something in this complete mess and I kept you by my side in the process. At least for a little while longer. Give me these odds any day and I'd do the same again.”

“I never should have trusted you. Not the Illuminati in general, not you in particular. When everything went to shit, at least they stayed and are trying to do something about it. And where were you?”

Tony rolls his eyes. “Mighty good it did. I took a well-deserved holiday. Sun, pool and lovely people. You would have hated it. And after a few weeks I came back, and I did do something about the Cabal. Or do you see one of the others in here? I was the only one dangerous enough for them to do something about.”

“Or just the only one stupid enough to get thrown into a cell.”

Steve watches, perplexed as the armor liquefies, retracting from Tony’s head, his left arm and shoulder and winds itself around him in a different form, reinforcing the gauntlet on his right arm. Then Tony strikes at the glass pane, giving it a crack.

They stare at each other for what is most likely minutes. Steve doesn't know what to say anymore. It's over.

Before, he would have been outside, fighting. No matter the odds. And Tony would have been with him. No matter what had happened, what they had done to each other. Now he has spent eight months hunting down the man standing on the other side, hating every moment of it.

He got over everything Tony ever did. They always made it through. But not this time. Nobody will make it, Steve is sure of that and there is no forgiving of what Tony did.

Their staring is disrupted by Tony's left hand starting to flash. He holds it up and numbers glow, hovering above the palm. 

_01:20:18_

“Well Captain, if you wanted to go down with memorable last words, you should come up with them soon.”

It's a countdown. No time left. Nowhere left to run.

“Back then, you said I broke first. What did you mean?”

“This is what you wanna hear in the last hours of your life? Be my guest.” Tony looks not as comfortable with the topic as he makes believe, his smile too bright, his movements mechanical.

“The gauntlet was the only real chance we ever had. You took it and it broke, when you broke.”

Steve shouldn’t feel this pang of remorse. Not because of something Tony says. He has no right to make Steve feel this way anymore.

“You said it had to be me. You made me use it.”

“Because using it is an extension of one's will. Nobody I know is quite as stubborn as you are. Nobody else could have done it. You were supposed to be stronger than us.”

“You mean stronger than you.” He never thought that he was and if he tries to be honest with himself for just a moment, he still doesn’t.

“Yes, that is what I thought for a very long time. But in the end, I had to pick up the slack and do what you didn't even want to think about.” Tony glares at him darkly.

“Why? You always say it had to be this way. You can’t predict the future. So how do you know there was no other way that could have saved at least something.” What he wants to say is, that could have saved us, from ending up here. Steve tries to get the sentiment out of his head with a slight shake.

Why are they still discussing this? Is he fool enough to still look for something that isn't there?

Tony’s words sound considerate for once, as if the admission is hurtful even for him. “Probability. We actually met the world where the heroes stood up and did the right thing at the same time as saving their earth. Namor killed them. They made it through two incursions before meeting their end. We would have been dead a long time ago.”

“You never even saw a decision, did you?” Steve says when he realizes it. “For you it was me or the world.”

“Yes.”

And Steve almost gets it. Tony is a man of priorities, always has been. And that the world comes first and Steve after that? He would agree. But it doesn't change what Tony did and how he did it. He needed to solve the thing before it happened. Creating his way forward, just to turn around and wonder how he got there. Dooming them both in the process, caught in their respective trajectories, bound to collide.

Tony interrupts his thoughts again, “We could also be out there and do something about this.”

Steve thinks about it and it takes him just seconds to decide. This was the way it was always going to be. The end of the world, Tony and him together. And only that hasn't really changed. Everything has changed, but where else would he be.

“I think you are right.”

Tony looks as surprised as Steve feels when the cubes disappear, and they are both free.  
“That’s all it took?” Tony sounds pissed off. Most likely because he did not think of it before it happened.

Steve looks at him. “Are we going to do this? A last stand? You know we will not survive this day, right?”

“I have no illusions, but at least we’re dying for something.”

And Steve can see the man he once knew. There is so much wrong about the picture, but underneath it all, there is still a shadow of his Tony. It's not a happy notion, but it’s something. Maybe the only thing important in this moment.

“For what we once were,” Steve says and extends his hand. Tony grins a bit too bright and takes the hand. Steve pulls him in for a hug. The other man huffs but is only stiff for a split second and then relaxes. His arms are tight around Steve's sides. Something warm slithers back into Steve's heart. A feeling familiar and so right that it hurts. He lifts a hand to Tony's head carefully, sliding his fingers through his hair.

“It could not end differently, could it?” Steve asks in a whisper, his voice more rasping than he expected.

“No, I suppose not.”

It takes only a second. His left hand tightens around the back of Tony's head, his right grabs his chins and twists. A crack and he sags into his arms. Steve lowers him carefully to the ground and leaves.

The end of the world has come.

**Author's Note:**

> Major character death, Tony Stark.


End file.
